Economic Sustainability of European Business Aviation Airports Supervisor: Prof. Dr. Matthias Finger Manager IGLUS Program: Umut Alkim Tuncer Executive Student: Dr. Yves Corrodi Year 2017/18 Master Thesis Acknowledgments First of all, I would like to thank Prof. Matthias Finger, who is the IGLUS founder and supervisor of this thesis. I was introduced to the IGLUS Executive Master and financially supported by IWB. Without the support from IWB, I could not join the program and attend the inspiring modules. Further, I would like to thank representatives from the Zurich Airport, Cat Aviation, Swiss and ETH – based on a preliminary discussion of the results on senior management level, the analytical part and the conclusion of the thesis could be sharpened. Special thank goes to Helge Dilger, who provided the title illustration and to Ms. Evelyne Corrodi backing me up during the busy time of writing a master thesis besides a full‐time job. i Abstract IATA publishes above‐trend air passenger growths and a record load factors. The UN expects the population living in urban areas to increase from 55% to 68% by 2050, which could add another 2.5 billion people to urban areas. Considering these trends, the demand for air transport is expected to increase within large, complex and dynamic urban systems, while spaces remain limited. Airports play an important role for urban systems, but they also exploit a comparably wide area. Due to capacity limits, major European cities built new airports slightly outside the city center (in example Paris, Frankfurt, London, Milan or Munich) focusing on the line and charter business. Existing city airports and smaller airfields, then concentrate on general and business aviation. But is this a sustainable use of land – are these airports economically sustainable, who owns and operates them and what are the related success factors? This thesis will answer these questions based on quantitative analyses of nine European airports with a significant amount of general and business aviation aircraft movements. ii Contents 1 List of Figures 1 2 List of Tables 2 3 List of Abbreviations 3 4 IGLUS Context and Motivation 4 5 Research Question 6 6 Literature and Conceptualization 7 6.1 Existing Literature 7 6.2 Development of an Airport Ownership Structure 10 6.3 Specifying a Value Chain for GA/BA Airports 12 6.4 Selection of Europe’s Major GA/BA Airports 15 7 Empirical Study 18 7.1 Paris Le‐Bourget Airport (LBG) 20 7.2 Geneva Airport (GVA) 23 7.3 Nice Airport (NCE) 26 7.4 Luton Airport (LTN) 29 7.5 Zurich Airport (ZRH) 32 7.6 Milan Linate Airport (LIN) 35 7.7 Düsseldorf Airport (DUS) 38 7.8 London Biggin Hill Airport (BQH) 41 7.9 St.Gallen‐Altenrhein Airport (ACH) 44 8 Data Analysis 47 8.1 Evident Traffic Trends 48 8.2 Balance between Shareholders and Governmental Owners 50 8.3 Strongly Varying GA/BA Charges 52 8.4 Sustainable Financial Performance 55 8.5 Typical Value Chain Shares 58 9 Summary and Conclusion 61 10 Further Research 63 A References 64 iii 1 List of Figures Figure 1: Conceptualization of the Thesis ..................................................................................... 6 Figure 2: Airport Charges Structure of German Line and Charter Airports .................................. 9 Figure 3: Industry‐Wide RPK vs. Global GDP ................................................................................. 9 Figure 4: Ownership Structure of Europe’s 25 Busiest Airports ................................................ 11 Figure 5: Commercial Perspective of the Aviation Value Chain ................................................. 12 Figure 6: Economic Profits in the Aviation Value Chain ............................................................. 13 Figure 7: Airport Value Chain Proposition .................................................................................. 14 Figure 8: Selected BA Airports ..................................................................................................... 17 Figure 9: Europe’s most run BA Aircrafts ................................................................................... 19 Figure 10: LBG Air Picture ........................................................................................................... 20 Figure 11: LBG Breakdown of Capital as of the 31.12.2017 ........................................................ 21 Figure 12: LBG Value Chain Coverage ......................................................................................... 22 Figure 13: GVA Air Picture ........................................................................................................... 23 Figure 14: GVA Value Chain Coverage ........................................................................................ 25 Figure 15: NCE Air Picture ........................................................................................................... 26 Figure 16: NCE Value Chain Cover ............................................................................................... 28 Figure 17: LTN Air Picture ........................................................................................................... 29 Figure 18: LTN Value Chain Coverage ......................................................................................... 31 Figure 19: ZRH Air Picture ........................................................................................................... 32 Figure 20: ZRH Value Chain Coverage ......................................................................................... 34 Figure 21: LIN Air Picture ............................................................................................................. 35 Figure 22: LIN Value Chain Coverage .......................................................................................... 37 Figure 23: DUS Air Picture ........................................................................................................... 38 Figure 24: DUS Value Chain Coverage ......................................................................................... 40 Figure 25: BQH Air Picture .......................................................................................................... 41 Figure 26: BQH Value Chain Coverage ........................................................................................ 42 Figure 27: ACH Air Picture ........................................................................................................... 44 Figure 28: ACH Value Chain Coverage ......................................................................................... 46 Figure 30: ‐Annual Amount of PAX 2013‐17 ............................................................................. 49 Figure 31: ‐Annual Increase of PAX 2013‐17 ............................................................................ 49 Figure 32: Ø‐Annual Aircraft MOV 2013‐17 ................................................................................ 49 Figure 33: Ø‐Annual Development of MOV 2013‐17 .................................................................. 49 Figure 34: Ownership Structure of the GA/BA Airport Operators .Ø ............................................. 51 Figure 35: Cumulated Charges Pilatus 12 .......................Ø ............................................................ 53 Figure 36: Cumulated Charges Falcon 2000 ................................................................................ 53 Figure 37: Cumulated Charges Gulfstream 500 .......................................................................... 53 Figure 38: Total Charges for the Exemplary Turnaround Flights ................................................ 54 Figure 39: Aviation Revenues 2013‐2017 ................................................................................... 56 Figure 40: Non‐Aviation Revenues 2013‐2017 ........................................................................... 56 Figure 41: Ratio Aviation Revenues per PAX 2013‐2017 ............................................................ 56 Figure 42: Profits 2013‐2017 ....................................................................................................... 56 Figure 43: Fixed Assets 2013‐2017 .............................................................................................. 57 Figure 44: Equity Share 2013‐2017 ............................................................................................. 57 Figure 45: Comparison Average Aviation Revenues and exemplary BA flight ............................ 57 Figure 46: Airport Value Chain Coverage Type I – Airport Operator in Charge .......................... 59 Figure 47: Airport Value Chain Coverage Type II – Shared Value Chain ..................................... 59 Figure 48: Airport Value Chain Coverage Type III – FBO as a Tenant ......................................... 59 1 2 List of Tables Table 1: Eurocontrol: The 15 most Frequented European BA airports ....................................... 16 Table 2: The German Handelsblatt: The 10 most Frequented BA airports ................................. 16 Table 3: The Aviation Week Network’s Top 50 BA Airports Worldwide ..................................... 16 Table 4: LBG Runway System and GA/BA Operational Hours ..................................................... 20 Table 5: LBG Traffic Characteristic .............................................................................................. 21 Table 6: ADP Financial KPI ..........................................................................................................